Crackdown 'breeding corruption'

A senior Chinese economist warned that the government's measures to battle overheating in the economy were breeding corruption. Wu Jinglian of the Development Research Centre under the State Council said that, by tightening up the approval process for loans, well-connected state firms had been able to flourish while smaller companies were struggling to raise cash for new projects, the South China Morning Post reported. While recent reports have pointed to signs of a soft landing for the Chinese economy, Wu said that �too much administrative control� was creating difficulties for the private sector. "One outcome is corruption," the Post quoted him as saying.